


all we'll ever need

by Wunderboy



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: F/M, Gen, give clint more screentime 2k15
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-13
Updated: 2015-12-13
Packaged: 2019-09-17 12:19:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 513
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16974480
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wunderboy/pseuds/Wunderboy
Summary: There is a baby wrapped in a blue blanket sleeping soundly in the other room. He weighs a little over seven pounds, has ten fingers and ten toes, a little tuft of brown hair, his mother’s eyes, and his father’s nose.





	all we'll ever need

“You’re the dad of baby boy Barton, I presume?”

Clint inclines his head slightly and sees a petite nurse standing behind him, holding a clipboard in her hands. Clint doesn’t turn to look at her, but he nods his head in response.

“Do you already have a name for him?”

There is a baby wrapped in a blue blanket sleeping soundly in the other room. He weighs a little over seven pounds, has ten fingers and ten toes, a little tuft of brown hair, his mother’s eyes, and his father’s nose. From behind the glass window, Clint keeps his gaze fixed on his son’s sleeping form and nods his head once more.

Laura comes to him with a list of baby names, in what he assumes is an attempt at some much needed normalcy, a week after the mission in Sokovia. There are perhaps a dozen different names on the list, put together by the both of them over the course of Laura’s pregnancy. She chooses the first name, one of her favorites marked in red ink; Clint forgoes the list entirely and suggests the second.

“It’s Nathaniel,” Clint answers firmly. “His name is Nathaniel Pietro Barton.”

When he provides Laura a sombre explanation afterwards, when he finally tells her about the twins and what had happened during the team’s run-in with Ultron, she wraps her arms around him and tearfully nods in approval. She asks him no further questions. For a moment Clint’s stunned, finds himself unable to do anything but breathe, before he gingerly returns Laura’s embrace. As she begins rubbing circles against his back, Clint closes his eyes, feels his body start to shake with what feels like relief coming off him in waves, and is once again wholly grateful for his wife’s understanding.

She too is painfully aware that the gesture is the closest to a thank you that they can offer.

Despite all fervent attempts, his life with his wife and their children will never be normal. Clint knows this. But he also knows that he is, in no way, shape, or form, a god, a super soldier, a millionaire with a metal suit. He knows that he has faced an intergalactic fleet and an army of robots entirely with his bow and arrows and has come out of both situations alive. So he continues to try anyway–Clint spends two days fixing their lawn mower in the shed, he cooks dinner with Laura, reads his children stories before he tucks them into bed, commits all the lines on his newborn’s face to memory.

Clint moves forward.

When he eventually turns to the nurse, he sees her writing down his son’s name on her clipboard. She looks back up at him when she’s done, and Clint grins shamelessly at her. The nurse offers him a warm smile in kind, tucks her clipboard under one arm then turns to go, and he occupies himself by looking back at his son.

He feels his grin grow wider.

The little rascal’s finally awake.

“What?” Clint chuckles. “You didn’t see that coming?”


End file.
